Val's SS journal- Fair food! Yea!

[valmom]

I wish I had a broody hen- I've been trying to trigger one to go broody for years. Now I don't have a rooster anymore, so I am buying chicks. Maybe I will get a roo by accident- I hope! I didn't want a straight run since too many roos would be a disaster (my SO won't condone culling- we'd have to have separate areas for each roo so they didn't fight and it would be a real pia)

We have our hen infirmary in the basement, and I am perfectly OK with house chickens

 

[keljonma]

HOUSE CHICKENS - That is *definitely* us!!

Here is our mudroom with our first flock getting to the age where they are moving to the barn.....

And breaking a broody hen in the mudroom...

 

[valmom]

I love it! That's what our basement is going to look like in a couple of months!

 

[Denim Deb]

Love the bird's nest pic! Not 100% sure, but I think that's a chipping sparrow.

 

[valmom]

Our little momma sparrow is just so much better at sitting on eggs than the dumb robins around here! We have a few robin nests and they fly off at any excuse. The sparrow is literally 3 feet outside our slider and sits on her nest through dog looking at her, noise and talking, TV on, slider opening and closing as we go in and out, curtains opening and closing. She is dedicated.

I am going to buy a gallon glass jar today at agway- I saw one in their canning section- and I am going to try to get a kombucha scoby to grow from a bottle of our local coop kombucha. It isn't pasteurized and says raw on it, so I'm hoping. I've never seen a real whole scoby in one, but it has a lot of floaty stuff and settled out stuff in it. It may work- I hope. I will start with just a quart of tea in the jar so I don't overwhelm the little bugs to start growing! Hopefully I will have my own kombucha before hot weather gets here. I've been reading all the old kombucha threads and if this doesn't work, I may be begging someone to sell me a scoby! But, of course, if I can do it myself I'd rather- like all of us

 

[valmom]

I have taken the plunge and posted Polly on Craigslist. She has been up on dreamhorse, but hasn't sold. Her time at the boarding barn runs out Wed and she has to move home where she will unfortunately be relegated to living in a stall with a run-out instead of back with the herd. I have to find a home for her because she had started picking on my old alpha mare who really is fading fast- I don't want her last summer (probably) to be fighting to keep her rank while being herded away from the hay and water!

Someone wish me good craigslist vibes that I find a good home for her! I have listed her for $500, but she would be free to a good home where she can be ridden and used and have people of her own.

http://westernmass.craigslist.org/grd/2407395891.html

 

[Denim Deb]

Good luck. She's a pretty girl. Hope you find a good home for her.

 

[savingdogs]

We see lots of free horse ads in our county right now. I hope the market for horses in your area is better. We kind of have a lot of horses for how close we are to Portland in our county.

 

[valmom]

I know the horse market stinks- and has for a couple of years now. I just want her to have a new home and not have to spend a lot of time back here where I have to juggle and finagle her and the rest of the herd.

 

[valmom]

Anyone know anything about growing a "three sisters" garden? My SO has actually given up a part of her lawn and made me a sunny flat garden! YEAH! Now she wants to put a three sisters garden in the spot- that's fine since I have been planning squash and corn and I have 2 kinds of drying beans- Indian Woman and Jacobs Cattle.

I just can't picture how it works- how does the squash have room at the foot of the corn to grow and how do the beans not choke out the corn?